OOO FLAVUS AND OTHERS v. RUSSIA JUDGMENT achieve those aims. In the present case the questions of compliance with the law and of the existence of a legitimate aim cannot be dissociated from the question of whether the interference was “necessary in a democratic society”. The Court will therefore examine them together (see Kablis v. Russia, nos. 48310/16 and 59663/17, § 85, 30 April 2019). (c) “Prescribed by law” 30. The Court reiterates that the expression “prescribed by law” not only refers to a statutory basis in domestic law, but also requires that the law be both adequately accessible and foreseeable, that is, formulated with sufficient precision to enable the individual to foresee the consequences which a given action may entail. In matters affecting fundamental rights it would be contrary to the rule of law, one of the basic principles of a democratic society enshrined in the Convention, for a legal discretion granted to the executive to be expressed in terms of an unfettered power. Consequently, the law must afford a measure of legal protection against arbitrary interferences by public authorities with the rights safeguarded by the Convention, and indicate with sufficient clarity the scope of any discretion conferred on the competent authorities and the manner of its exercise (see Hasan and Chaush v. Bulgaria [GC], no. 30985/96, § 84, ECHR 2000-XI, and Ahmet Yıldırım, cited above, §§ 57 and 59). 31. Access to the applicants’ online media was blocked in accordance with section 15.3 of the Information Act. That provision allowed the Prosecutor General or his deputies to request the blocking of three categories of content, including calls for mass disorder or for participation in public events held in breach of the established procedure. However, the Court’s scrutiny of the lawfulness requirement is not limited to establishing whether the State agency acted in accordance with the letter of domestic law. The Court must also ascertain whether the quality of the law in question enabled the applicants to regulate their conduct and protected them against arbitrary interference. 32. In the instant case, the Prosecutor General’s blocking request mentioned calls for participation in unauthorised mass gatherings, while Roskomnadzor’s notice referred to calls for extremist activities (see paragraphs 6 and 7 above). Subsection (2) of section 15.3 set out requirements in respect of the contents of Roskomnadzor’s notification, which had to specify, in particular, the URL of the web page permitting illegal content to be identified (see paragraph 12 above). The actual notices which Roskomnadzor had despatched in the instant case deviated from that requirement in that they listed the website’s entire domain, rather than a particular problematic webpage (see paragraph 7 above). Not only did that failure run counter to the requirement that the information provided by Roskomnadzor should permit identification of the content to be taken down, but it also deprived the applicants of the opportunity to remedy the 11

Select target paragraph3